Field
Example aspects described herein relate generally to contactless protocols and more particularly to systems, methods, and computer program products for providing a contactless protocol allowing interoperation between mobile devices, near field communication (NFC) readers, and point of sale (POS) systems.
Related Art
NFC technology is a standards-based wireless communication technology that allows data to be exchanged between devices that are positioned within a certain proximity, generally less than ten centimeters apart. One use of such NFC technology is for making contactless transactions, including those for payment, access and ticketing. For example, an NFC-enabled mobile device can be provisioned with a payment application and payment account information (i.e., credentials associated with a financial instrument such as credit or debit card) issued by a consumer's financial institution. Each payment application can store and manage multiple sets of commerce data associated with multiple merchants, manufacturers or brands on a secure element. The application and payment account information are typically encrypted and stored in a secure area in the mobile device. The mobile device can, in turn, use the NFC technology to communicate with NFC-enabled point of sale (POS) systems at attended locations such as stores and unattended locations such as vending machines. To pay, the consumer simply brings the mobile device to within approximately ten centimeters of a contactless payment-capable POS system and the transaction occurs. The process is typically the same as that used by the contactless credit and debit cards.
Placing the mobile device or contactless credit or debit card near an NFC-enabled reader so that they can be communicatively coupled is sometimes referred to as a “wave” or “tap”. An application for a mobile device that allows consumers to “tap to pay” at a NFC-enabled POS systems is generally referred to as a “wallet application” or “mobile wallet client application.” An application related to payments is generally referred to as a “payment” application. Common contactless payment applications are facilitated using any of the following technologies: American Express® “ExpressPay,” Discover® “ZIP,” Mastercard® “PayPass” or Visa® “PayWave”.
NFC can also be used to read information about products or receive special offers, loyalty or rewards information from, for example, NFC tags, smart posters or smart billboards. An application related to offers, loyalty and rewards is generally referred to herein as a “commerce” application.
One technical challenge associated with utilizing payment and commerce technologies cooperatively involves the ability to allow the same tap event that sends payment information to include additional information associated with merchant loyalty cards, offers, rewards, and the like. To this end, messaging technologies in existing NFC readers or NFC-enabled payment POS terminals stand to be upgraded to effectively support a messaging technology that retrieves and/or receives both payment credentials (using the aforementioned payment protocols) and additional commerce data (loyalty, offers, rewards, etc.) from mobile devices used to perform the transactions. Yet another technical challenge involves publishing commerce elements (e.g., offers, loyalty card credentials, rewards, and the like) into a mobile device such that those commerce elements may, in turn, be presented as part of a typical POS transaction (e.g., a purchase).